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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26140663">the point, piercing</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/callmearcturus/pseuds/callmearcturus'>callmearcturus</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Magnus Archives (Podcast)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Set in Episodes 159-160 | Scottish Safehouse Period (The Magnus Archives), mediocre poetry</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 10:41:10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,980</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26140663</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/callmearcturus/pseuds/callmearcturus</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>for hurt/comfort week</p>
<p>Martin keeps crying over nothing. It's nothing. It has to be nothing.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Martin Blackwood/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>41</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>559</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>the point, piercing</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>i'm doing it, i'm finally writing a safehouse thing. this is vaguely for the hurt/comfort event, but this concept has been living in my brain for a while now.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It came over Martin at the strangest times. He couldn't find any rhyme or reason to it.</p>
<p>The first time he noticed it, it was their second night in the cottage. Jon had excused himself to go and hand-wash the tea cups. A nice cup of passiflora and chamomile was helpful before bed, and Martin was cracking yawns as the night wore on. The temptation to stay up, make another cup, to keep talking idly was seductive.</p>
<p>But he didn't fancy falling asleep on the sofa when they had a perfectly serviceable bed. So Martin got up and went to the bathroom to wash up.</p>
<p>It was while he was brushing his teeth that he noticed the tracks of wet running down his cheeks. He froze mid-scrub, his lips a minty cloud of foam.</p>
<p>Twin lines shone, bending over the apple of his cheeks, following the stubborn roundness of his face. As he watched, he felt the trail touch his neck.</p>
<p>Jerking from his frozen shock, he reached up, rubbed away the ticklish lines, wiped his face.</p>
<p>Under it was just him. His eyes were a little red but otherwise… he was fine.</p>
<p>With a grimace, Martin spit into the sink. What on earth was <em> that </em> all about?</p>
<p> </p><hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>Martin wasn't sure when the next time was. Sometimes, he would simply wipe his face and come back with a bit of damp. Once, he was at the tiny village library, picking out some DVDs for them to watch, and the titles blurred until Martin stroked his jumper's sleeve over his eyes.</p>
<p>Sometimes, Martin would look out before the roadside fence, see the distant blobs of cows in the field, and his throat would lock up.</p>
<p>He'd heard a long time ago that when a person shivered out of nowhere, it was because someone had just trod over their future grave. Which both seemed silly and a little pointless, as far as superstitions went. But it was all that came to mind for him; somewhere, something was happening, and by virtue of the butterfly effect, he was crying.</p>
<p>Back at the cottage, Martin toyed with the idea.</p>
<p></p><blockquote>
  <p>
    <em>everyone is part of a pole<br/>
a needle stabbed into a chart<br/>
eight billion points coming out<br/>
twelve point seven thousand kilometers apart<br/>
my foot lands, and your point pierces my soul</em>
  </p>
</blockquote><p>Was that decent? Bit of wordplay.</p>
<p>It didn't even work, Martin thought as he flipped to a new page with a sigh. Plenty of people didn't have someone on the opposite point on the planet, did they? It was all ocean.</p>
<p>Even if everything he wrote was terrible and rusty from lack of practice, the sight of Martin scribbling in a moleskine made Jon smile. That was nice.</p>
<p> </p><hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>It was inevitable that Jon would catch it happening.</p>
<p>It didn't go well.</p>
<p>Martin knew he was pointlessly crying again when Jon looked over at him from the fireplace. The way Jon's face went slack was everything.</p>
<p>All Martin had been doing was watching Jon add another log into the fire. He hadn't been thinking about anything at all. But Jon got slowly to his feet and hovered like Martin was liable to shatter from a single wrong word. "Martin… Are you— no, stupid question." He swallowed. "What's wrong?"</p>
<p>The frustration was enormous. It was— they'd been having a nice night! Why did this have to happen again! Martin tugged his sleeve down and rubbed his face. "Goddammit… Nothing's wrong, I just, my face leaks a bit sometimes, it's nothing."</p>
<p>Jon's soft horror faded to something equidistant between bemusement and annoyance. "Your face just <em> leaks </em> sometimes," he repeated.</p>
<p>"Yes, <em> actually, </em> it does," Martin insisted. "I'm not sad or anything! I just get watery! It's more likely allergies than anything, really."</p>
<p>Jon's mouth worked for a moment. The idea, apparently, was difficult to accept. Martin didn't see why it was more difficult to grasp than anything else weird in their lives, honestly, and told Jon so.</p>
<p>"Can we just let it go," Martin said, voice tight.</p>
<p>"Right," Jon breathed, and reluctantly sat down on the sofa again.</p>
<p>Ideally, they would have gotten back to their quiet discussion, but Martin had by then completely lost the thread.</p>
<p>The silence after was loud.</p>
<p> </p><hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>It happened again, tears filling Martin's eyes as he folded laundry, making it hard to see.</p>
<p>"Martin," Jon started, careful.</p>
<p>"It's <em> fine </em>," Martin insisted, dumping the bedsheet he'd been holding onto the chair and going to wash his face.</p>
<p> </p><hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>It didn't need to be a big deal.</p>
<p> </p><hr/>
<p> </p>
<p>There were few meals they could collaborate on together. Martin could bake, but was a dreadful cook. Jon was a decent cook, but was overly exacting, and never really let Martin play sous chef.</p>
<p>Except, tonight, they'd picked everything out special. Pizza. Homemade pizza, with a nice ball of stretchy dough, fresh-torn cheese, and sauce. Sure, they could have just ordered a pizza, or picked up a frozen one from the shop, but nothing could ever surpass a genuinely homemade pizza. Something about doing it all made the whole thing taste better.</p>
<p>So Martin was in the midst of hand-crushing some canned tomatoes, watching Jon at the cutting board next to him. As Jon's long fingers dismantled basil and minced garlic, Martin's vision blurred.</p>
<p>Sniffling loudly, Martin tried to dry his face with his shoulder. "God, <em> come on, </em> really?"</p>
<p>Jon was immediately attentive, setting his knife down. "Martin?" His hand rested on Martin's shoulder.</p>
<p>"I'm fine, I don't know <em> why </em>I'm crying!" Martin snapped before he could help it. "There's no reason for it, it's just happening! What's the point of it?"</p>
<p>There was the sound of running water for a second, then Jon was wiping Martin's face with a damp kitchen towel. "Shh, it's alright," he said, voice papery with his whisper. "It's alright."</p>
<p>"It's not!" Martin's hands were still coated in tomato mush in the bowl, as sure as shackles keeping him there. "It's been days, can't it just piss off and leave me alone already?"</p>
<p>Jon withdrew the towel a bit, looking down at Martin with a knit brow. "I… Ah." His tongue touched his teeth for a second. "Look, I know. I <em> know </em> it's been hard, and I know you've been doing your best, what with the aftermath of it, and it's admirable, Martin. I can't imagine I'd have held myself together in your shoes, so I don't begrudge you the methods you use to keep a handle on it all, but I just worry that this tact you've been using isn't… going to hold out forever."</p>
<p>"What," Martin said, "are you talking about?"</p>
<p>The pinched look on Jon's face was familiar; he always seemed to get it when he had to talk about <em> emotions </em> directly. "The way you've been… acting as though it's not… yours." He reached out and swiped away another tear from Martin's face. "The tears, the underlying emotions. Whatever scars the Lonely left on you, they're not something you have— have to hide away or explain. Right? Right." He nodded firmly.</p>
<p>"I don't— I— Jon, I'm not—" Martin huffed out a breath. "I'm not secretly wallowing in misery over the Lonely."</p>
<p>"You cry in your sleep, you know," Jon said, low and quick. "Not, no heaving sobs. Just— this, just like this. It's quiet. I just wanted you to know, you don't <em> have </em> to be quiet."</p>
<p>"I'm fine," Martin protested.</p>
<p>And Jon's eyebrows lifted and dropped quickly, a sharp little microexpression that snuck out.</p>
<p><em> "Jon," </em> Martin said.</p>
<p>"I know, of course, yes. Martin Blackwood is always fine," Jon said, now with a little of that Jon Sims shirtiness that Martin had long since grown familiar and inured to. "My point is… if you weren't, that'd also be fine."</p>
<p>"What do you want me to do," Martin asked. "To— to cry about it? To have a bit of a weep over how weird everything is now? To wade into the— the— the pity pool and just have a splash about?"</p>
<p>If anything, Jon's eyes grew keener as he watched Martin. Not pleased, but less irritated.</p>
<p>Which only incensed Martin further. "I already did all my crying already, why would I need to do it again? There's no <em> point, </em> I can't— can't fix any of it!" He clenched his hands in the proto-tomato sauce. "I can't bring Mum back, can't get a redo on that, I can't get back the months you were away, I can't get back the months you were here but <em> I was away, </em> I can't—" His voiced cracked, and Martin blinked through the fresh tears. "God, not again!"</p>
<p>Jon curled a hand around Martin's jaw and wiped his face again. "It's alright."</p>
<p>"No, it's not! Stop saying that," Martin pleaded. "It— I— It has to be like this, because I— I don't know how to fix the rest of it. It doesn't go away." He shut his eyes, blessedly relieved at the cool touch of the damp towel over his warm cheeks. "What if it never goes <em> away?" </em> he said, the words breaking in his mouth by their own weight.</p>
<p>Jon sighed deeply. It stirred through Martin's hair. "Then, we deal with it. Together."</p>
<p>Together. Martin laughed, a choked, horrible thing. That made Jon still.</p>
<p>"I'm serious," Jon murmured.</p>
<p>"You are now," Martin agreed. "Sure, yeah. But wh— what if this is just it?" He sniffed loudly. "What if I'm just broken now? What if it doesn't get <em> better </em>, what if I'm always going to— to be this sad bastard who just cries, who can't get past it?" When Jon opened his mouth, Martin pushed on. "You, Jon, you're… lovely, and honestly you wiping my tears away is maybe the nicest thing that someone's done for me, but what about in another week?" He smiled grimly. "A month? Six months?"</p>
<p>Jon blissfully shut up for a moment, to Martin's intense relief. It wasn't just <em> fine, </em> he had to really think about this as much as Martin had. It often seemed no one thought things through the way Martin did, really.</p>
<p>He was a romantic, of course. But it was the saccharine-sweet icing over a pitch dark chocolate torte, dense and pragmatic and too rich for most people to handle.</p>
<p>All Martin's life, he'd learned to know better. Hope for the best. Prepare for the worst.</p>
<p>After turning it over in his head, Jon pulled Martin back from the counter, to the sink. Guiding him, Jon helped rinse Martin's hands, and flipped the towel around to help dry them after.</p>
<p>As he squeezed Martin's hands through the cloth, Jon said, "What about a year?" Martin blinked. "What about two? What about the rest of your life?" He leaned down, until his fringe brushed lightly against Martin's forehead. "What if the things you've been through never truly fade, and remain with you from here on out?" He shrugged, almost casual. "Then so will I."<br/>
<br/>
Martin shut his eyes as they began burning again. "Jon."</p>
<p>"I'm serious, Martin," Jon whispered, and pressed his lips against Martin's forehead. As he eased back again, he said, "If that's the rest of your life… it's the rest of mine too."</p>
<p>"No," Martin said, shaking his head.</p>
<p>"If I have to learn to carry those little packs of tissues everywhere, just in case, then I'll do it." His hands closed around Martin's shoulders, his cheek resting heavily in Martin's hair. "I mean it. It's alright, Martin. I'm not leaving you. And we— I…" He stopped, and gathered himself. "We've both been marked."</p>
<p>Martin bent, covering his own mouth with a hand. His throat was hot and tight, closing around his desire to sob.</p>
<p>Jon's hand slid up to stroke Martin's hair. "It's alright," he said again, for the dozenth time. "Even if it's not, that's alright."</p>
<p>Leaning into him, hiding against Jon's body, Martin cried. His own tears, this time. Like every other time before.</p>
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